According to OpenSea, the NFT marketplace they manage has no items belonging to the company.
Non-Fungible Token (NFT) marketplace OpenSea has announced it raised the sum of $23 million led by new investors including Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Naval Ravikant, and Mark Cuban amongst others in a Series A funding round.
The blockchain technology and cryptocurrency world has evolved in the past decade, ushering in a host of disruptive innovations including decentralized finance and NFT as we have it today. The aim of this tech though diverse in nature has an underlying similarity, and it revolves around the use of the power of blockchain to upturn the redundancies of existing innovations in our world through decentralization.
The advent of NFTs has particularly ushered in a unique economy for digital artists who create artworks that are registered on the blockchain. OpenSea aims to be at the forefront of this new Non-Fungible Token economy, creating a level playing ground for the host of innovative creators leveraging its platform.
“At OpenSea, we are growing and shaping this economy by building the world’s best, largest, and most trusted marketplace for this new type of digital asset. Over the coming years, billions of people will be introduced to digital ownership, and we’ve built OpenSea as a trusted entry point into that world,” said Devin Finzer, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer at OpenSea.
The latest funding will help the platform to build on its growth, as seen since it was created back in late 2017. While the bulk of activities on the platform peaked this year, toward the end of January, the gradual development of the marketplace is responsible for the acclaim it is currently getting in the NFT metaverse. The daily volume of NFT-based items traded topped $10 million this month, with total transaction volume growing by over 100x in the past six months.
Besides the new backers, OpenSea also declared support from older investors including Blockchain Capital and NFT thought-leaders including Metapurse, the world’s largest NFT Fund established by MetaKovan, the man who threw in the $69 million winning bid for Beeple’s artwork dubbed “Everydays: The First 5,000 Days.”
OpenSea NFT Marketplace to Empower Creators
According to OpenSea, the NFT marketplace they manage has no items belonging to the company. Finzer noted that “The 20 million+ NFTs you can trade on OpenSea are not owned by OpenSea, they are owned by users,” adding that “this is a huge paradigm shift, and the first glimpse into a world where users, not corporations, control their own data.
Moving forward, the company aims to build on the growth of the platform making the core tenets of blockchain technology – that is decentralization – reign.
Highlighting the achievements of the company since inception, and the experience of the OpenSea founders, a16z confirmed its core role in the Series A funding round, reaffirming the Venture Capital company’s commitment to promoting anything blockchain-related.
Benjamin Godfrey is a blockchain enthusiast and journalists who relish writing about the real life applications of blockchain technology and innovations to drive general acceptance and worldwide integration of the emerging technology. His desires to educate people about cryptocurrencies inspires his contributions to renowned blockchain based media and sites. Benjamin Godfrey is a lover of sports and agriculture.
